By: VALERAN

About 3,000 Words

Peace filled my heart as I watched my son frolic about in the afternoon sunshine. The trade winds were blowing steadily from the northeast, sending the palm trees into a soft dance, whispering to one another as the wind brushed against their fronds. My son, who was nimble as a butterfly, pursued imaginary foes with his 2-dollar sword, and his shield made from an old cardboard box that used to be the home of our computer monitor.

I smiled when he ran up to the banyan tree. That green behemoth with bent branches that would evoke visions of a green monster that was poised to devour the house. There he would halt at the edge of the tree’s shade, and swing his mighty weapon at the beast, crying out to it.

“Go away! Go Away! I will not let you eat our house!”

Knowing the battle was lost; my son retreated from his superior adversary and began to wander the yard like a bandit searching for new cities to raid.

The warm island air combined with the chorus of bird songs was beginning to cloud my mind. My eyes drifted away from my son and instead fell upon the mighty dragon tree next to our front door.

In my younger days, I had imagined the dragon trees to be like the great dragons of lore. They stood poised beside doorways, windows, or in the middle of yards, as though to guard the entrances to great magic castles, where princesses were kept to live miserable lives, until knights brave enough to challenge the dragons freed them from their prisons.

For this, I hated the dragon trees. As a young girl, I detested the fact that the female race fell constant victim to the wrath of dragons. I wanted to show the world how unlike a dragon captive I was.

I rebelled, I fought back, I would take my sword and attempt to stab at the hearts of the dragons who wanted to keep me imprisoned within the iron bars of feminine roles.

I was brought back from this memory of my youth by the sound of a large crash, followed by my son’s fearful cries.

“Mama!” He cried, running to me in obvious fright. “Mama! My sword!”

My first thoughts were that his 2-dollar sword had shattered against a much harder surface. But when he presented me with the unblemished blade, I saw immediately what the cause of his distress was.

The tip of the plastic sword was covered in red, as though my son had really brought his sword upon an enemy.

“How did this happen?” I asked, trying to keep my son calm.

“The tree!” He cried “The dragon tree. I was pretending that it was a real dragon, so I tried killing it to get inside the castle. When I hit it, I cut it, and blood came out and the tree started shaking! It’s angry at me!”

Fear was overflowing in his eyes, and his anguish tore at my heart.

“Oh, my dear baby boy.” I said soothingly, caressing his smooth brown cheeks. “Don’t be afraid. The dragon tree is not angry with you. See, the dragon tree used to be a real dragon. It’s angry because it’s no longer a dragon and instead has to live as a tree.”

Immediately, the half-moon eyes became full moons at what my son had just heard from me.

“The dragon trees were real dragon?” He asked in awe.

“Yes.” I smiled. “A long time ago, when people still fought with swords and armor.”

“Do you want me to tell you the story?” I teased.

“Yes. Yes. Yes!” came his enthusiastic response.

I said, “Ok” amidst a suppressed laugh as I lifted my little son upon my lap. The sap-coated sword lay amidst the kou nuts before my feet.

“Now” I began. “Long ago, in Europe and Asia, the dragons were born.”

“Europe and Asia are far away, right mommy?” interrupted my son.

“Yes,” I said calmly, exercising my patience. “They are on the other side of the world.”

“Then why are dragon trees all over?” He asked.

“Wait until I finish, love.” I whispered, patting his head of raven hair.

“The dragons in Europe were very big, and they had big bat wings, long necks and tails with sharp eagle-like claws, and breathed hot fire. These dragons you can still see on the shields of old knights.”

“I’ve seen those when we were watching about King Arthur” said my son.

“In Asia, the dragons were different. They had magical powers and could change into any creature they wished. However, their true forms were just as scary as their European friends were. They had no wings, yet their snake-like bodies could fly. They had horns & beards and spikes on their backs, and instead of fire, these dragons spat water.”

“Yes. The ones with many people holding the dragon on sticks, swinging it around to the beat of the drums.”

“Oh.” smiled my son. “What happened to the water-spitting dragons?”

“Well” I continued. “The water dragons and fire dragons were very fierce and scary. The lords of the dragons always had more than one head, so that they can keep watch over their many people.”

“It must be very hard to have more than one head.” said my son with a frown “It looks ugly too.”

“Not to the dragon lords!” I laughed, “The dragon lords were the most beautiful and the strongest of all the dragons. But all the dragons, it seemed, were very naughty.”

“How come?”

“Well, you’ve heard stories of dragons burning villages, kidnapping princesses and eating the cows and sheep of people right?”

“Yes.” My son nodded. “How come they did that to people?”

“No one knows why they were very naughty. It was not only to people that they were naughty to. They would burn and flood forests and other wild places for no reason, killing all the animals and plants.”

“How bad of them!” cried my little son.

“Yes, very bad of them.” I continued. “So bad that the gods of nature wanted to do something about them.”

“Gods?” my son said, no doubt perplexed at the word. “How can there be other gods when the priest says there is only one?”

“I think so, ” said my son. “These are the angels who look after plants and animals.”

“Yes.” I said. “So, these nature angels were so angry that the dragons were killing everything that they wanted to get rid of the dragons.”

“So, were they going to kill them all?” asked my son.

“Oh no!” I said. “The nature spirits didn’t like killing. That’s why they wanted to get rid of the dragons.”

“But on TV, they said that in order to get rid of someone, you had to kill them.”

“Oh dear!” I cried. “Is your father really letting you watch these things?”

“No,” He said calmly. “I heard the older kids talk about it in school.”

“Oh, ok then.” I said, tension disappearing from my body. “Just remember, the older kids in school don’t really know some things. It’s best to ask a grown-up.”

“So how were the angels going to stop the dragons?”

“Well, one day all the nature spirits came together. The King was the ruler of animals, and the Queen was the ruler of plants. All the other spirits, from the tree spirits, to the fish spirits, to the flower spirits were there. The King stood up and asked the animal spirits. ‘Who is brave enough to challenge the dragons?’”

“That’s the problem. No one answered him. No one was strong enough to beat the dragons.”

“The Queen asked the same thing to the plants. And the same, no one answered her.”

“So, what happened? Did they give up?”

“If they did give up, the dragons would still be here.” I laughed.

“After a few minutes, one of the insect spirits stood up. He was the King of Moths”

“Moths!” My son said in surprise. “But, they are so small, and easy to crush! How were they going to beat the dragons?”

“That’s what all the other angels were thinking. How was one of the weakest spirits going to defeat the mighty dragons? They all thought he was crazy. But since he was the only spirit to stand up, the rest of the spirits respected him for his courage, yet they still were not sure how he would defeat the scary dragons.”

“So, how was the King of Moths going to defeat them?”

“Well, since he was so weak, the Queen gave him her sword to fight with. It was a magical sword, and it made the Moth King stronger.”

“Which kind of dragon did he fight first? The fire dragons?”

“Actually, No.” I said. “He went to China to fight the water dragons.”

“But why?” My son cried. “They are stronger and scarier!”

“But they did not spit fire, and you know how moths are attracted to fire so much that they burn their little wings. So the Moth King thought that it would be better for him to fight the Asian water dragons first.”

“It’s better drowning to death than burning to death.” I reassured him.

“It’s better not to die.”

“Exactly! And the Moth king was sure he would live if he fought the water dragons than the fire dragons. Let me continue the story, please?”

“Ok.” he said, leaning back to rest his head on my shoulder.

“Well then, the Moth King found the strongest Dragon Lord in China. The great Dragon Lord was big, with hundreds of heads!”

“He must have looked very ugly,” said my son. I laughed at this and continued.

“When the Dragon Lord heard that the Moth King was to challenge him, of course he thought the Moth King was crazy. How could a spirit of insects beat the Lord of Eastern Dragons? So just to make it more humiliating for the Moth King, the Great Dragon Lord decided to change himself into a human dragon.”

“Human dragon?”

“Yes. You heard that some people in Asia have ancestors who were dragons. Those dragons could turn into humans and marry humans. So the great Dragon Lord changed himself into a Chinese warrior-prince, with a great spike from his back as a sword. And in this form he challenged the handsome King of Moths, since the nature spirits thought humans to be very weak.”

“So, the Dragon Lord thought it would be funny to fight the Moth King as a human, just to show how weak the Moth King is?”

“Yes,”

“Very hard. I think it took them many days.”

“So, how did the Moth King win?” asked my son excitedly.

“You are sure that he won?” I asked.

“Yes! You said the dragons would still be here if he lost.” I laughed at my son’s attentiveness.

“Well, the Moth King, although he was tired after days of fighting, was still very fast with his sword. And finally, he was able to stab the Dragon Lord through the heart!”

My son gasped. “Did he kill him?”

“No! The nature spirits would never kill. The sword went through his heart, but instead of dying, he became a dragon again, with his hundreds of heads. And the sword in his heart turned him into a tree with scaly bark and many heads of green spikes.”

“A dragon tree!”

“Yes!” I said. “When the Nature spirits saw how the King of Moths was able to defeat the powerful Dragon Lord by turning him into a tree, they also began to fight the dragons. They turned them into dragonheads, dragon fruits, dragon stones, snapdragons, komodo dragons and other creatures bearing ‘dragon’ in their name”

“It seems like that.” I replied. “Now with no more dragons, people were no longer afraid, and soon humans began to have lots more children, and build bigger cities. The dragons meanwhile, have learned their lesson, now that they have become plants and animals like the ones they used to burn and drown. So you see, our dragon tree came from those dragons that were punished by the nature spirits”

“Mama, what happened to the Queen’s sword? Did the Moth King give it back?”

“Well, No.” I smiled. “The Queen’s sword is still stuck to the Dragon Lord’s heart, even now when he is a tree. But there is a legend that says that one-day, a young strong man will find the great dragon tree and pull out the Queen’s sword. Then the spell on the tree will be broken and the Dragon Lord will live again.”

Moments of silence drifted by as my son sat still within my arms, as though trying to contemplate a deeper meaning of the tale I had just told. Suddenly, he wriggled from my grasp and took up the sword that lay at my feet. Running to the open lawn, he began to twirl and slash with a greater ferocity than before.

“What do you think you are doing?” I asked him, amazed at his newfound vigor.

“When I grow up to be fast and strong, I will find the dragon and set him free. I know that he deserved what he got, but I’m sure he doesn’t want to be a tree anymore. I know that if I free him he would be nice to me and help people instead of eat them.”

I marveled at the confidence of my little warrior, fighting his invisible foes like the heroes of old. Confidently preparing for that fictional future that he wished for.

I had no doubt in my mind that he would grow up one day to be strong and brave, and inherit my own sword which was sheathed in the depths of the dragon trees of my youth. I know he will bear it well. He will show the dragons of the world that his mother was no dragon captive, but a worthy woman who, like the Moth King, was not afraid to battle against a dragon and leave a sword to pain its heart.